Monday, January 14, 2019

Three charged with robbing DePaul student

UPDATE 7:10AM — Chicago police have now issued a third version of events.

According to a press release issued at 6:59 a.m., the DePaul student went to the 4200 block of West Wilcox last Tuesday to meet with Tarika Gilmore. During their meeting, the 19-year-old student was robbed by Gilmore and the other two offenders, police now say. Some of the victim’s property was found by police on Friday after police went to investigate a light that was on inside an abandoned home.

According to this latest version of events, the robbery occurred in the 4200 block of West Wilcox, not in the 900 block of West Montana.

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UPDATE 6:10AM — Chicago police now say that the three suspects robbed the student at gunpoint in an alley in the 900 block of West Montana around 8 p.m. last Tuesday. The student was never abducted and was not taken to an abandoned home, police now say.

Apparently, by coincidence, the three suspects were arrested Friday as they fled from an abandoned Garfield Park home where the victim’s property was found.

Earlier this morning, police issued an arrest announcement in which they confirmed that the student had been abducted at gunpoint and robbed in the 4400 block of West Wilcox. More than an hour later, they retracted the earlier statement and said that the student had never been abducted.

Adding confusion to the entire matter is that CPD’s chief spokesperson specifically said in a Tweet last week that the victim had not been robbed in Lincoln Park. Yet, that is now exactly what the department says happened.

CWBChicago’s earlier updates on this story follow….
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UPDATE 5AM —Chicago police have now issued a new press release regarding this case. According to the updated information, "The detectives' investigation revealed that the DePaul student's story about being kidnapped near the school’s Lincoln Park campus Tuesday night and driven to an abandoned house where he was robbed at gunpoint was fabricated."

According to the latest announcement, patrol officers late Friday night noticed a light was on in a vacant building in the 4200 block of West Wilcox. They knocked on the door and Jackson, Gilmore, and Davis ran out the back door. The three were detained. Inside the home, police found “proceeds…from a robbery that occurred on January 8, 2019, at 8:00 p.m. on the 900 block of West Montana.” That is a reference to the student's robbery.

CWBChicago has asked police for further clarification about where the student was robbed, if any abduction took place, and how they explain finding the victim’s proceeds in an abandoned home when they say the victim made up his story about being robbed in an abandoned home.

We will update this story (again) when details are clarified.

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After poo-pooing a DePaul University student’s claim of being abducted near campus and robbed last week, Chicago police this morning have announced charges in the case. News of the arrests comes after DePaul’s public safety office, and Chicago police issued statements that called the victim’s claims into question.

Police early Monday said the three offenders approached the 19-year-old victim in an alley in the 900 block of West Montana around 8 p.m. on Jan. 8th and forced him into a vehicle at gunpoint. The trio then drove the victim to a home in the 4400 block of West Wilcox in the Garfield Park neighborhood and used the victim’s debit card at a nearby gas station, police said.

The victim was robbed of his cellphone and other property before he was allowed to leave the home, police said.

Deaaron Jackson, 27, Tarika Gilmore, 18, and Lasam Davis, 24, were arrested Friday in a vacant apartment in the 4200 block of West Wilcox, according to police. The victim’s stolen property was allegedly recovered at the scene.

Jackson, Gilmore, and Davis are each charged with one count of felony armed robbery with a firearm and trespassing. They are due in bond court Monday afternoon.

DePaul’s Office of Public Safety last Thursday issued a community alert that said, “Chicago Police have determined that a student's report on Jan. 9 of being kidnapped near Fullerton and Halsted and robbed is false.”

Chicago police spokesmen said on the same day that “Detectives determined this was not a kidnapping and the victim was not robbed…near De Paul University. This also was not a random incident.”

But details in this morning’s press release indicate that the man was abducted at gunpoint from almost precisely the same place and time that he said he had been—in an alley near the McDonald’s at 2401 North Lincoln at 8 p.m.—and he was subsequently robbed.